My opinion is that no car manufacturer should expect the buyer to do any mods that can not be done with the contents of a basic tool kit (screwdrivers, knives etc.). To that end I think drilling holes in stuff and dremelling parts is a big no-no. My main reason for this is two fold;
1) if that part breaks trackside (especially at a practice event when not so many people have loads of kit with them) it can be the end of the day. That would get on my nerves to say the least.
2) some people don't have the equipment / skills to do a decent job and the result of that is at best a duff job, at worst a nasty injury.
Now I've been racing 2 decades plus, restore classic Minis for fun and have practically refitted my whole house myself so I'm not scared of a bit of "DIY". There is however no way that I'd recomend a car to somebody that needed this sort of work.
I understand why companies like X-factory do this though, to save the end user money (assuming that they can do the mods themselves). I have nothing but respect for those guys for getting their cars to the market and making them popular but I personally could never recomend an X5 to anybody because of the mods needed at build and repair times.
To my mind the easy option for companies like the X-Factory is to offer the option of buying pre-modified parts at a premium. That way those who could / wanted to do the mods could and those that didn't did not have to.
The above is an example only and in no way a negative post about X-Factory
As for the 2nd question of having to buy a specific part to use another upgrade part I think that is ok so long as it is clearly marked on the actual packaging in at least as large a font as the parts own number and description. It would be nice if both parts could be bought in the same pack but I don't think that is essential.
Just to make it clear both my cars have dremel type mods on them and the RB5 does have an upgrade that requires another part it's not supplied with (well actually Kyosho now do supply all the parts in one pack but they didn't when I did the mod). I have made those choices and if I have to run around to try and borrow a dremel at a meeting to replace the parts then so be it .... I am willing to take that risk as in both cases I doubt that the modded parts breaking would happen without doing enough other damage to make it impossible to get out in the next round, even at a national.
An example of this is my own design of rear shock tower for the ZX5-SP which does give performance gains but I do not run this at meetings as if I broke it and the set-up was based on it I'd be stuffed. When I get a batch from Fibre-lyte, AC, DC or whoever I'll start to run it but not before.
If I had to mod something like a wishbone or shock tower I'd not be happy running that mod unless I had enough spares with me to replace it if it broke every round ...... at which point I'd do with out the mod as to finish first you must first finish!
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